Dreams in the Rat House

Hardly Art;
2013

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Music from this release

Oakland trio Shannon and the Clams have a broad musical vocabulary that belies their simple, trad setup. Their sound contains lo-fi's distorted treble, the gruff tumble of rockabilly, the soaring heights of R&B balladry, and the weirdness of mid-60s psychedelia. Their albums have the feel of a freeform AM station whose DJs and programmers get their jollies from being gleefully unpredictable, the kind that wouldn’t think twice about following up a tender oldie like “Oh Louie” with a punkabilly romp called “Cat Party”.

Songwriters Shannon Shaw and Cody Blanchard frequently switch duties as lead singer, sometimes within the same song, which is testament to both their differences and the clarity of their shared vision. They’re singers whose range and timbre often makes it difficult to tell which of them is singing lead (which is more interesting than it is negative), but they're sharp lyricists with very different writing styles. On Dreams in the Rat House, Shaw’s “Ozma” is a touching eulogy about her dearly departed dog, while Blanchard’s “Heads or Tails” is a fictional narrative about a vagabond with a coin in his pocket that he flips whenever he needs to make a critical life decision.

Dreams in the Rat House combines elements of their debut, I Wanna Go Home (particularly the off-the-cuff hijinks and threadbare fidelity), with the songwriting focus of their great second effort, Sleep Talk. Songs like “If I Could Count” and “The Rabbit’s Nose” toy with complex melody and song structure while exhibiting the fine art of making it all look easy. “Rip Van Winkle” takes a generations-old fable and turns it into a monologue from a heart-struck woman waiting for a lover to return to her, and has a glittery lead guitar part and a soaring chorus that combine to far more than the sum of its parts. In the number of years they’ve played together, Shaw and Blanchard have learned how to disassemble the parts and rebuild them in a way that sounds both classic and wild at the same time.

But their chief attribute is how fun their songs sound. They can do sinister, ghastly garage-punk like the Mummies (“Bed Rock”) or throw faux-ghoulish noises that suggest parody but never cross that line (“Rat House”) without coming across as a novelty act. Blanchard and Shaw are dedicated enough to songcraft to the extent that it’s evident they’re not just fucking around.

One common misconception about certain corners of garage rock is that there's a lack of serious-mindedness among its proponents. But there’s a broad line between having a good time and making a joke out of something. When Shannon and the Clams pull out a ballad as affecting as “Unlearn”, it becomes apparent that they’re just as good at tugging heartstrings as cackling after tracking those googly noises in “Rat House”. When they craft a goodbye as poignant in its simplicity as “I Know”, it’s like Shaw and Blanchard know you’re going to realize you’ve underestimated the emotional resonance of their songwriting. And that’s when they know they’ve got you hooked.